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Annan's Role in Iraq Crisis
Prompts Concern in the U.S.

By

Robert S. Greenberger Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Updated March 11, 1998 1:55 a.m. ET

Shortly after United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan's triumphant return from Baghdad last month, Bill Richardson came by one night for a quiet chat over cigars. The U.S. envoy to the U.N. was upset by the way Mr. Annan was apportioning blame for the recent crisis with Iraq.

Mr. Annan's comments that Iraq is sometimes treated unfairly and Saddam Hussein is a man he can do business with worry Clinton administration officials. Their concern is that Mr. Annan sees himself not as an enforcer of U.N. resolutions, but an arbitrator between two equals -- Iraq and the weapons inspectors Baghdad has frustrated for seven years. And the U.S. frets that Mr. Annan may inadvertently aid Iraq by being drawn into endless negotiations in Saddam Hussein's cat-and-mouse games with the U.N.

As a result, when Mr. Annan meets Wednesday at the White House with President Clinton, U.S. officials will ask for his views on how he plans to proceed, rather than just how the agreement to permit inspections of Iraqi weapons sites is being carried out. As part of these discussions, the U.S. also wants to make sure that no deals were made that the administration doesn't know about. "The purpose of the visit is to solidify already strong relations between the president and secretary-general -- and explore ways to make sure the agreement works," says Mr. Richardson.

Criticized by GOP

The administration also has political concerns. Mr. Annan is being criticized by congressional Republicans, who always find the U.N. a convenient target and who now see doubts over Iraq policy as an opportunity to attack the White House. U.S. officials say the coming months will test Mr. Annan's ability to deal with Saddam Hussein and likely will also shape Washington's relationship with the secretary-general.

Ironically, the U.S. concerns about Mr. Annan come as U.N. weapons inspectors are achieving major breakthroughs in Iraq after Baghdad pledged unfettered access to inspectors and agreed, under special conditions, to first-time inspections of eight presidential sites. Last weekend, Scott Ritter, the American U.N. weapons inspector who was barred by Iraq two months ago, igniting a crisis, completed a round of sensitive inspections. Although it wasn't publicly announced, the inspection sites included for the first time Iraq's Defense Ministry. Senior Iraqi officials, including Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz, once warned that entry into that facility would be considered an act of war.

Moreover, Mr. Annan's aides say he is deeply committed to the agreement and is determined to shore up political support for it. The secretary-general plans to travel soon to Russia, China and Britain -- three of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- to bolster the accord. He already has visited France, another permanent member, both before and after his trip to Baghdad.

Walking a Fine Line

Still, one top U.S. official, who praises the initial implementation of the agreement, criticizes what he calls the "ambivalence" of Mr. Annan's approach. The official says Mr. Annan tries to walk a fine line between Baghdad and the U.N. weapons inspectors, and between the U.S. and France and Russia, which strongly oppose Washington's threats to use military strikes to force Saddam Hussein to comply with U.N. resolutions. The official adds that the U.N. chief naively believes that treating Saddam Hussein with dignity will produce Iraqi cooperation in return. The U.S. is concerned by such steps as Mr. Annan's appointing a political envoy to Baghdad who will report directly to him, rather than to the U.N. Security Council, where Washington wields a veto.

Part of the problem is that the U.S. wants Mr. Annan to share its view that Saddam Hussein is a menace who needs to be contained, by military force if necessary. Ironically, it was the Clinton administration that pushed Mr. Annan's candidacy 18 months ago as part of its effort to dump his predecessor, Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Mr. Boutros-Ghali had become a convenient scapegoat for the Clinton administration's early blunders in places like Somalia and Bosnia, as well as a symbol of the U.N.'s inability to trim its bloated bureaucracy.

Mr. Annan, who has spent three decades in the U.N. bureaucracy, is highly regarded. In a New York Times opinion piece earlier this week, he boasted that he has cut nearly 1,000 U.N. jobs, reducing the staff size to 9,000, and that administrative expenses are being slashed to 25% of the budget from 38%. Mr. Annan is also expected to discuss with President Clinton Wednesday what he calls the "debilitating problem" of the $1.3 billion the U.S. owes the U.N. And Tuesday the U.N.'s chief financial officer warned that the U.S. is close to losing its voting rights in the General Assembly if it doesn't pay its arrears.

Speaking of Mr. Annan, Rep. Lee Hamilton of Indiana, the ranking Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, said, "I've been favorably impressed by his leadership. He's pushed hard for reform. He's reached out to the Congress."

Lott Attacks 'Appeasement'

But after Mr. Annan got involved in the divisive issue of Iraq, some Republican lawmakers criticized him. Soon after Mr. Annan returned from Baghdad last month, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi attacked the deal as "appeasement" of the Iraqi dictator. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright quickly defended Mr. Annan, assuring lawmakers that many of the questions about the accord had been answered.

However, the administration was also troubled by some of the language in the agreement. Before his departure for Baghdad, Mr. Annan met four times in his private conference room with representatives of the five permanent security council members. The conditions imposed on him by the U.S. were so stringent that at one point Mr. Annan said he wouldn't undertake the mission just to be a messenger.

But one part of the agreement, in which Mr. Annan committed the U.N. inspectors to "respect the legitimate concerns of Iraq relating to national security, sovereignty and dignity," caught the administration by surprise. An aide, explaining Mr. Annan's negotiating style, says, "It came down to face-saving rhetoric about sovereignty. He gave up a little bit of language and came back with full compliance."

Since then, Mr. Annan has satisfied the administration's concerns that such language won't be used by Baghdad to thwart the inspectors. Whether Baghdad agrees with that view remains to be seen.

"We appreciate the diplomatic effort that Secretary-General Annan took," says James Rubin, the State Department spokesman and a top Albright aide. "We have every reason to believe the secretary general understands that it's what happens in practice that matters."